At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas opening
today, LG and Lenovo will show TVs that allow users to search
for shows and Web applications with natural-sounding voice
commands. Samsung introduced three high-end models with so-
called Smart Interaction technology, which builds in motion-
sensing and voice-command software similar to Microsoft Corp. (MSFT)’s
Kinect peripheral for the Xbox 360 video-game console.

“You now can turn on your TV simply by saying, ‘Hi TV,’
and you can change channels simply by talking or gesturing,”
Ethan Rasiel, a spokesman for Suwon, South Korea-based Samsung,
said in an interview.

Getting consumers to pay up will be tough. Last year, most
buyers shunned sets bringing “Avatar”-like 3-D theater
experiences into the living room. Since 2009, the average price
of an LED TV, the most common type sold in the U.S., dropped 35
percent to $817 from $1,254, according to researcher NPD, which
projects a 16 percent decline this year. Three-dimensional sets
made up 9 percent of sales in 2011 through November, from 2
percent a year earlier.

Manufacturers also confront a rapid customer shift away
from traditional TVs. The number of people tuning in to TV sets
in a typical week fell to 48 percent in 2011 from 71 percent in
2009, according to an Accenture (ACN) survey in countries including
the U.S., China, Russia and Brazil. Those planning to buy a TV
set during the next 12 months declined to 32 percent in 2011
from 35 percent in 2010.

Grabbing Consumers

To break out of the slump, set makers are introducing
features to grab consumers as the switch to flat panels did
eight years ago, when millions of consumers swapped out their
cathode-ray tube, or CRT, sets.

“There’s a lot of good technology and connectivity that
we’ve been putting out there, but that may be less revolutionary
for consumers than the form-factor change of so long ago,” said
Jeff Barney, vice president for Toshiba America.

Manufacturers are offering models that connect to online
content and wirelessly to smartphones, tablets and personal
computers. Improved screen technology and thinner designs are
also part of new lineups as they struggle to persuade shoppers
to pay a premium.

Lenovo, based in Beijing, will initially sell sets with
voice-command features in the Chinese market.

Watching Apple

Some models sold by Samsung this year will have facial
recognition features that can detect users and automatically log
them onto Web-based services including Skype Technologies SA’s
Internet calls, said Lee Kyung Shik, a vice president at
Samsung’s TV business.

“Our ‘smart’ TVs will get smarter,” Lee said. “TVs will
be able to listen, see and do things for consumers and
viewers.”

Many of the new features are already used on other devices,
such as the Xbox’s Kinect. Apple Inc. (AAPL)’s iPhone 4S provides
voice-interaction software called Siri that tries to answer
questions like: “What’s the weather today?”

Apple co-founder Steve Jobs told his biographer, Walter Isaacson, before he died that the company was working on a new
TV interface.

Samsung, LG and other makers are also increasing sets’
processing power and memory to give viewers the ability to do
several things at the same time, like stream content and
videoconference via Skype with friends.

Sales Goal

Samsung aims to sell more than 50 million flat-screen sets
this year, compared with about 43 million units last year, Yoon
Boo Keun, head of the company’s consumer-electronics business,
said at a media briefing in Seoul. That would be a faster pace
than the industry’s projected growth of 7 percent to 8 percent,
Yoon said.

Like Samsung and Tokyo-based Sony Corp. (6758), LG is looking to
televisions using organic light-emitting diode, or OLED,
technology to prompt consumers to replace sets more quickly.
With OLED, individual pixels can glow without a separate light
source. Sets can be made wafer-thin, or in entirely new sizes
and shapes.

LG, based in Seoul, plans to begin selling a 55-inch ultra-
thin OLED television, and include its motion-sensing Magic
Remote, which also adopts software from Nuance Communications (NUAN),
the world’s largest supplier of voice recognition technology.

None of the manufacturers disclosed pricing plans.

New Technologies

OLED sets are expected to sell for $6,000 to $8,000 this
year, said Kumu Puri, a researcher and senior vice president in
Accenture’s electronics and high-tech industry group.

“It will take some time before we see wide-scale
adoption,” Puri said.

Sales of giant, 60-inch flat-panel televisions jumped 160
percent last year only after Sharp (6753) and Samsung introduced models
priced well below $2,000, according to NPD DisplaySearch.

Sony and Toshiba also were expected to show set sets that
incorporate so-called 4K resolution of 4096x2160 pixels, or
double the resolution of current high-definition TVs.

Such sets may be years away from retail shelves because of
a lack of high-definition content that can take advantage of the
technology, Kaz Hirai, executive deputy president of Sony Corp.,
said in a recent interview.

While Web-connected televisions won’t stop the industry’s
price slide, they give set makers the ability to build
advertising businesses and partner with Google Inc. (GOOG), Facebook
Inc. and others, Skott Ahn, LG’s chief technology officer, said
in an interview.

“We are trying really hard to bring new connectivity to
our customers and share revenue with our partners,” Ahn said.
“When you look at it as part of a strategy, it’s the
centerpiece of the home.”